Author: keith@finnett.net

After a good sleep, we headed out to find breakfast – a 25 minute walk down to the River Clyde, and along a bit. The mist was hanging over the water and the sun was warm, but at zero Celsius it was slightly cold! We stumbled across a section of river wall covered in graffiti, apparently something that’s encouraged in specific locations.

Breakfast was excellent – I had a Vietnamese coffee (made with condensed milk) and Jo’s food was basically a breakfast burger.

Then a wander around Glasgow until lunch. We stopped at Barras market, with stalls of every single kind of thing for sale (including some large spiders in frames), found one of the old and remaining Glaswegian police boxes, a jewellery shop with two windows in which were (I estimated) £30m of gems – one ring alone was £350,000 – and Glasgow Central station.

Lunch was at a place called Katsu. Whilst they had no melon soda (strawberry only) the food was superb. After lunch we wandered back to the car, and found another statue with a cone on its head – this time a mural.

From Glasgow we headed west, to Ardrossen, the port linking the mainland to the Isle of Arran. Whilst waiting to board we had some pre-baked cake from home, and apples from M&S which were apparently pink inside.

The crossing to Arran was extremely calm but action packed. First dolphins and whales which were about 200-300m from the boat (so very hard to see, let alone photograph), then multiple sightings of porpoises near and far from the ferry. We’ll get some better pictures on another crossing, maybe.

Once ashore, we found our hotel in a village near Brodick, called Lamlash. Nothing too exciting, more rooms above a pub, with live music until 10pm.

Then we drove back into Brodick for dinner. We had a couple of potential places in mind, neither bookable. Fortunately the first choice was nearly empty – but incredible food – we shared tartaflette and croque monsieur, then had a creme brulee each. Tiny restaurant, probably 16 seats in total, with a chef in a tiny galley kitchen.

On the way to the restaurant we saw a small group of people gathered on the shoreline looking at something. Turned out to be a juvenile harbour seal, which couldn’t care less about the people taking pictures. On the way back to the car it was in the same area, but on the nearby rocks – cleaning itself, generally hanging out. This time no people – just us.

Breakfast – Scran & Roadie, Glasgow
Lunch – Katsu, Glasgow
Dinner – The French Fox, Isle of Arran
Hotel – Glenisle Hotel, Isle of Arran

The day that wasn’t originally planned….

We set off at 7am. Not because we had a ferry to catch, as that was booked for Saturday afternoon, but because Jo had been asked by her headteacher to be very, very important at some kind of Masonic meeting for grammar school headteachers at a school in Penrith. Patently Jo’s boss couldn’t be bothered to go, so delegated it to one of her minions.

Whilst she did her funny and very, very important handshakes, I had a walk round Penrith – took 20 minutes, wouldn’t recommend, the town is a bit of a dump – and then mostly sat in the car. I rotated between car parks for Booths, Morrisons, and a nice farm shop we found on the way in. Lunch for me was a foot-long sausage baguette, and the king of cakes (Victoria sponge). Jo had school sandwiches.

Four and a bit hours later, she was done and we resumed our journey to Scotland. Pretty uneventful, other than a non-UK registered articulated lorry whose driver had clearly fallen asleep as his suddenly swerved into my lane, then back. We have good brakes and didn’t die (it was too close). And only one border crossing on this holiday.

We found the hotel (very nice, too), changed and headed out for dinner – Italian. On our walk to the restaurant we encountered our first be-coned statue. Apparently it’s been there for 30 years and has become a national Scottish thing – but in Glasgow they’re left, whereas in Edinburgh they’re removed.

Glasgow, third biggest city in the UK and home to 20% of the Scottish population, looks very much like Newcastle we thought. Confusing road systems over a river, the city centre has a grid-like layout, and built across many slopes making some streets quite steep. Some really nice buildings, too.

We had Italian food and wine (the table behind confusingly ordered steak and peppercorn sauce….maybe they thought it was an American Diner) then wandered back to the hotel via a very nice cocktail bar (Pear Drop for Jo, Old Fashioned for me). Weirdly we saw a group of youths raving in the middle of the street, with a DJ and PA system set up – having a great time, doing no harm, good old fashioned rave music. I remember the days…. Oh, and more cones on statues.

Dinner – Santa Lucia, Glasgow
Hotel – The Wellington, Glasgow

We’re off to Scotland, for a two week road trip around the Inner and Outer Hebrides. With 9 ferries to catch, 13 hotels to stay in, 1,550 miles to cover and around 43 hours in the car, we’ve a lot ahead of us. And we packed sleeping bags, just in case of ferry cancellations!